Just a diversionary story about life outside the US until everyone gets back to arguing:
In Japan, the police can hold you in jail for questioning without charging you for... (are you ready?)
27 days.
Then they have to get a judge to sign off on a second 27-day interrogation period, before placing any charges. Here's an interesting story about being a foreigner:
A foreigner got a little tired of his neighbor's dog barking continuously all night long, every night, so he stopped at the house on the way back home from work and knocked on the door. He asked the middle-aged man if the dog was hungry or ill since he would pay to send it to a vet. The guy's teenage son walked around behind the foreigner and sucker punched him from behind. The foreigner turned around and him hit.
The police carted him off to jail for questioning. Of course the teenager didn't go to jail because, well, he was Japanese. The police interrogate people for 10 -12 hours per day in shifts until they sign a confession. If you don't sign a confession, you stay in jail and get convicted. He eventually signed a confession and paid apology money to avoid a long prison sentence.
Japan has a 99.5+% conviction rate. If you don't plead quilty, your sentence is harsh. If you plead guilty, your sentence is harsh, but a little shorter.
If you are a white-collar criminal, confession and a tearful apology will get you convicted, but your sentence will be suspended - always. Well, not always. I think 2 or 3 guys have been sentenced to a few months prison in the last 3 years for bribery or stealing a billion yen.
The great thing is, you usually don't have to pay back the money! What a country.
Traffic accidents are great. The police show up and after reams and reams of paperwork, everyone shares guilt in all accidents. No one is a harmless victim. If you're sitting at a red light and someone rams into the back of you, you are 20% at fault for having bad karma. Oh... and no day in court needed for these types of things. The police decide who pays how much on the spot. Cuts down on pesky trials.
In the days before the war, the police were the yakuza and the yakuza were the police. It would be hard to categorize the relationship as 'unfriendly' even now.
Small time thugs have a weekly quota of cash they have to give to the local yakuza boss. A favorite little con is the fake traffic accident con. Two little thugs will drive next to some drunk, hapless guy then stop and claim he kicked their tire. The police cart him off to jail until he confesses and agrees to pay the equivalent of $2,000 - $5,000 (depending on how much he looks like he can cough up) as an apology. They go the local ATM machine, or he agrees to pay it in installments. If he doesn't pay, the police come around his house to collect. The police make a cut and the thugs can pay the boss.
Nothing like a little entrepreneurial spirit to keep currency circulating.
Okay, back to the arguing...
